Winemaker Notes
Harvested at 22.5 Brix, Counoise is always our last varietal to come into the winery. Displaying medium-sized berries on large clusters, it’s also one of the heaviest. 100% destemmed fruit fermented in 5-ton open top fermenters and aged for 10 months in neutral French oak barrels. Counoise is mostly used as a blending varietal in the Southern Rhone. We initially planned to blend it for our first vintage, but Eaglepoint Ranch’s Counoise is unique from what’s typically seen in the few plantings that exist in the state. A medium bodied wine with nice acid, elegance and white pepper on the finish.
We are a 'low wattage' winery in the sense that we have very little modern equipment. Grapes are pitchforked whole-cluster into the fermenters, fermentation is allowed to happen spontaneously, all wines are basket pressed, with little/no sulphur used in our wines until bottling. True asphalt winemaking, in an urban winery.
A large and diverse appellation within California’s North Coast AVA, Mendocino is home to several smaller sub-regions—most notably the Anderson Valley. This scenic region, with rolling hills covered in redwood forests as well as vineyards, is one of the world’s top producers of certified organically-grown grapes. Due to wide geographical and climatic variation, a vast array of wine styles can be found here.
Beyond the usual suspects, there are hundreds of red grape varieties grown throughout the world. Some are indigenous specialties capable of producing excellent single varietal wines, while others are better suited for use as blending grapes. Each has its own distinct viticultural characteristics, as well as aroma and flavor profiles, offering much to be discovered by the curious wine lover. In particular, Portugal and Italy are known for having a multitude of unique varieties but they can really be found in any region.